Message Templates are the blueprint for what the message will look like when its assembled. This is a very powerful component to the messages system because it allows for more granular control of the “looks” of outgoing messages.

The important thing to remember about message templates, is that there is a message template for each messenger, message type, and context combination. So for example, there is a template for the email messenger, registration approved message type, and Event Admin recipient (context).

Each message template will have fields that are defined by the messenger primarily but also supplemented by the message type if there are any additional fields required by the message type. For instance, all email templates will have to, from, subject and main content fields.

When you activate Event Espresso, the message system comes with default global templates out of the box that will help you get started right away with your events without having to do any editing. However you are able to edit any of these templates.

Difference between Global and Event specific templates
One more powerful feature with the new messages system is that by default, global templates will apply to every trigger happening with an event. So that means, for example, when a registration is approved (the trigger), all the global templates using the Registration Approved message type get sent. However, the messages system also allows Event Authors to create a custom template for that message type to be used only for that event. If this is done, then when the Registration Approved message type is triggered the message template for that event is used instead of the global message template. This allows you to differentiate different automatic messages for different events.

Customizations

• Enqueue your own styles or scripts via this hook (and just add the regular wp_enqueue_style() etc in your function):
  AHEE__EE_Html_messenger__enqueue_scripts_styles
  That should load any CSS scripts/styles AFTER the messages styles/scripts.
• Learn about Registering a Messages Template Variation

A context describes who or what receives the message. You won’t see the word context much in the UI for messages because the labels for contexts are dynamic and are defined by message types (but can also be overridden by messengers). When defined by the system, they will take on a label that more accurately describes the intent. For instance with all the current message types in the system there are up to three contexts available (which are labelled recipients in the UI): event admin, primary registrant, and registrant. The purpose of the context is to empower you to be more granular in the messages you send out.

As an example, for the Registration Approved message type, the event admin may receive summary details of the registration that was approved, whereas the primary registrant will receive information pertaining to the whole group registered, and the registrant just receives details on their specific registration for the event.[1]

Keep in mind that the number of contexts available per message type and messenger combination is variable depending on how they’ve been designed by us (or the third-party plugin for the messages system). For instance, we didn’t include the registrant context with any of the payment message types because its really only the primary registrant (the one who completed the registration) who is concerned with paying for the tickets.

When editing message templates, it is important to keep these contexts in mind, see Message System: Working with message contexts

Messengers are part of the Event Espresso Messages system. Messengers describe the vehicle or method that delivers the messages. The most common delivery vehicle pretty much all of us are familiar with is email. As of this writing, email is the first and currently only messenger used by the messages system. Which is why we intentionally built the messages system so it would act more like a framework for being able to rapidly add different kinds of messengers and message types for Event Espresso.

Currently there are 3 types of messengers: Email, HTML, and PDF. The Email messenger delivers email, and the HTML messenger generates the HTML Receipts, Invoices, and Tickets (available with the Ticketing add-on).

How to activate and deactivate a Messenger

To activate/deactivate a Messenger, navigate to Event Espresso > Messages > Settings and click on the control. When the control is green, that means the messenger is activated. When the control is grey, that means the messenger is deactivated.

Turning the control on/off (green/gray) will deactivate all the message templates for that Messenger. In this example, the message types that are in the Email Settings panel will all be activated or deactivated depending on the status of the Messenger control.

You can control whether individual messages are active/inactive by either: 1) editing the message and turning the control on/off, 2) dragging and dropping the message type from the Active to the Inactive Message Types panel as shown above (for example, the Ticket Notice message type is set to be inactive), and 3) removing the recipient from the TO line in the message template.

Message Types describe the kind of message that is being sent and describe what the content of the message. There are Message types for payment related messages (payment received, payment reminder, payment declined, refund issued). There are Message types for five registration related messages (registration approved, not approved registration, registration pending, registration declined, registration cancelled, newsletter). Message types are attached to triggers[1]

You can control whether individual Message Types are active/inactive by either: 1) editing the message and toggling the control on/off, 2) dragging and dropping the message type from the Active to the Inactive Message Types panel in the Messages Settings tab, and 3) removing the recipient from the TO line in the message template.

If you see a Message Type, with a Messenger recipient grayed out, then the message is turned off for that recipient (e.g. the Event Admin, Primary Registrant, or Registrant).

Message shortcodes are special snippets of text that allow for precisely controlling how dynamic content will display in the message template. If you are familiar with how WordPress shortcodes work then using these shortcodes should be fairly straightforward. Shortcodes such as [EVENT_NAME], [REGISTRANT_FNAME], [EVENT_AUTHOR_FORMATTED_EMAIL] all provide an easy way to indicate where dynamic content will be inserted when messages are sent.

There are also special shortcodes that we call list-type shortcodes. These are shortcodes such as [ATTENDEE_LIST], [EVENT_LIST], and [QUESTION_LIST][1]. These shortcodes are special because when you use it, you are indicating that this is where you want a list of items to be displayed in your template. When the message generator[2] gets to this shortcode, it will signal it to look for a corresponding field in the template to know how to parse each item in the list. So when you see a field in a message template that is labelled with [event_list] then you know that when the [EVENT_LIST] shortcode is parsed, the generator will look in the
[event_list] field to know how to parse each event item.

Display Answers to Questions in Your Templates

To display all answers:
You add the
[QUESTION_LIST] shortcode to the [ATTENDEE_LIST] section, then within the
[QUESTION_LIST] section you can add the [QUESTION] and [ANSWER] shortcodes.

To display individual answers:
Add the
[RECIPIENT_ANSWER_*] shortcode in a valid location, and use the question display text you are testing. In my case the question was “What color?” so when I added the shortcode it was

[RECIPIENT_ANSWER_* What color?] I also prefaced the shortcode with the actual question text so I could tell that I was seeing the right message when I received it.

Note: It is VERY important that your question display text match exactly what the question is.